[A shortened form of BASTILE.] (See quots.)
1811. Lex. Balatr., Steel, the house of correction.
1812. J. H. Vaux, Flash Dict., Bastile, generally called for shortnes, the steel a cant name for the House of Correction, Cold-Bath-Fields, London.
1839. in ‘Ducange Anglicus,’ Vulgar T. (1857), 35. The steel, the tread-mill.
1877. [W. H. Thomson], Five Yrs.’ Penal Servitude, i. 5. A series of rapid inquiries as to who I was,… had I ever been in the ‘steel,’ a slang name for one of the large metropolitan prisons, as the ‘Gate’ is for Newgate.
